In Tenebris
by Rez1
Summary: Sark in captivity


**In Tenebris**

_**One**_

After two weeks he knows that Irina hasn't been found. After three, that Sloane's managed to pull something off, something big. He pieces it together, out of the questions they ask.

He's protested that he's adaptable, his loyalties flexible. They'll buy that, up to a point.

"I need one month," she'd said. She knew what she was asking. She didn't touch him that time. She observes a certain delicacy in these things, with him.

"This is the end," she'd said. "We're almost there."

Almost where, he doesn't know or care. He'd walked into the club in Stockholm on the strength of her promise, knowing what he knows about her. He'd wavered on the edge of refusal. Habit won, in the end—that, and the certainty that he could handle it.

One month.

"I'll see to your extraction personally," she'd told him, and little else. Meanwhile, he would rather have something more interesting and less painful to occupy him. But his notoriety had grown enough that he's an effective distraction, buying time from inside while she does—whatever it is she does.

He doesn't share this obsession of hers, but he misses their partnership. He's never matched the exhilaration of working with her, of stretching instincts and abilities to meet another's with such perfect accord. He's never told her.

One month and counting.

He's alive. There's been some rough play but nothing to what they could do if they chose. They haven't moved him.

Either they're finding him useful or banking him for trade, believing he might be worth something to someone. He does the permutations, in the endless time between interrogations, trying to fit the questions against some pattern of suspicion or understanding. It would help to know what they're really after.

Waiting is an art he learned early. Events will unfold, in time, as planned—or not. He'll deal with it however things fall out. But he does miss her.

He knows the layout, of course, from making the trip so often. They vary the route but for some reason always bring him to the same room. He knows the intersection where a fault in the ventilation system has warped the marble cladding off its bed against the concrete wall. Sub-par workmanship, poor maintenance—not that it matters. There's nothing there he can use.

"Jesus, kid, she really had you whipped." A sympathetic face, a sympathetic voice, inviting him to agree, knowing he won't.

"You had to know about Khasinau, right? And you're gonna be different? She must really be something."

The taunts are predictable:

"Fucking the boss—kid, that's stupid. Or is she your mother?"

And the tactics more so:

"_Pretty_ blue eyes—" and a caressing thumb along his jawline. He turns his head, presses his open mouth against the palm of the man's hand. The answering blow all but cracks his cheekbone.

So that's out of the way, for now.

The cell is never dark. There's never a moment when he's alone, unwatched. He holds her name in his mouth, unspoken, as he sinks into the meditative trance she taught him.

The more intense physical sessions, which begin during what he believes is the second month, leave him unable to maintain his accustomed baseline of strength and speed. He loses mass, and the extreme physical coordination that has always served him, saved him, till now. The bigger danger is loss of integrity, self-disgust.

"—Why hasn't Sloane made his move? Where would he go after Mexico? What's his deal with Derevko?"

They aren't really expecting answers, or they may already know the answers. These questions are just for—kicks. The pain eventually makes him vomit. That puts an end to it, for a while; they don't like the mess.

Humiliation is a never-ending game they play. He loses often enough to satisfy them.

He keeps inventory of each physical failure, a list for later, when he can rebuild. Without her hands knitting his body and brain together, it becomes difficult to care, the link more tenuous than he'd thought.

He sees this dependency clearly for the first time, begins patiently to construct an armature of his own resolve, of hard lessons, thoroughly learned. Her touch was always a test, never just a pleasure. Pain is also a test, then. The chill air of the cell replaces her warmth against his skin.

Three months now, he guesses, though he can't be sure.

He doesn't think, in retrospect, that there was any special finality to their last conversation. "This will be difficult," she'd said, as to a child, and he'd been irritated. He wonders, now, if she weren't talking to herself. She's not without feeling.

They hadn't made love. But he was never satisfied that way, anyway. He always wanted her, was always, it seemed, waiting for her smile, her hand leading him to whatever bed she slept in that night. She would laugh at him sometimes.

"_Moy malyi sver_," she would say. _Little beast_. "Find someone your own age. I'm busy." He would smile and try to coax her otherwise.

"—Sydney?" he'd asked once, hoping to test her temper. But she'd only smiled back, something unreadable moving through the ophidian ice of her gaze, and he'd let it drop.

He hasn't seen her daughter since Stockholm—or the lover, the green-eyed _galant_.

Amusing that Irina had once made it his task to keep her daughter safe, while she herself lay here, perhaps in this very cell. He wouldn't mind seeing Sydney. He could always get a reaction out of her. And she looks like her mother.

A certain calm, he finds, has descended to replace his unquestioning reliance on his own physical skill. He accepts it cautiously, knowing it will curdle to despair unless he's watchful.

He forces himself to eat what they give him. Keeping it down is a problem as the chemicals build up in his system. His nails are brittle. His wrists and knees are perpetually sore.

He can't be sure anymore what they've learned from him. He knows all the tricks, but drugs and pain are powerful, and men only men. Half the time he isn't really conscious.

He's still trying to get what he can, data in every question, every jolt, even in the boot to the ribs or the jab of another needle in his arm. He's still giving them information, as he knows Irina intended. Timing is everything—almost the first lesson she ever taught him.

"What did Sloane offer you to sell her out?"

—That's interesting, he thinks hazily. Might be able to do something with that.

He figures they believe him less than half the time anyway.

He lies awake, eyes blind, his hunger for her a live coal in his belly. He could forget the cameras, get himself off, relieve the immediate need. He snuffs the impulse, turns onto his side, shielding himself until he's calm again.

It's not unusual for plans to change. There's always a fallback. He tries to calculate the likelihood that she's still counting on him. He thinks it's probable.

But it's surely been more than three months, now.

He begins to plan for other contingencies, as much to blot the constant thought of her from his mind as anything. He wonders about loose ends. The matter of Allison, and the others, but especially Allison. He'll need to remedy that, at some point, if possible. If Irina hasn't.

_**Two**_

It's all part of the show. After enough iterations, the reaction starts when they appear outside his cell, unlock the door, motion him forward. The body understands what's coming. The feedback loop begins: Dry mouth, cold sweat, tremors in the hands, the knees. It's fear. The body knows.

The same door, every time, solid steel, three-ply glass window reinforced with wire mesh. They walk him through the corridors—always two men, rarely the same two—one before, the other behind. They haul open the door and shove him through and it locks behind him. There's a single chair. He sits and waits. Sooner or later the next detail shows up and the session begins.

There's always a point at which one of them nods to the presence behind the two-way glass. That's when they switch off the cameras.

Even fear is tedious after a point—even pain. He's so bored he's put a name to every face. Today's guides are Sheena, a platinum-blond gorilla with a silky moustache, and the Dickensian Sikes, who has a remarkably villainous face but who overacts just slightly, grimacing for effect. He's never heard either of them speak.

He gets the familiar shove and finds himself facing a woman just rising from her seat across from an empty chair.

Blonde. Clever, pleasant face, measuring blue eyes; about Irina's age. Something in her expression reminds him—but anything might, now.

Don't anticipate. They've decided to try something different, that's all. This one's seen all the video, he's sure, maybe watched through the glass. She'll know every humiliating detail. That's fine.

He's engaged in spite of himself. She's certainly the most interesting thing he's seen in—four months? His reckoning's hazy but it's a little late, surely, for the good cop to show up. He shuts down his interest, irritably. Whatever it is, he's certain he won't like what this one has for him.

She inclines her head politely, gestures at the chair. "Please sit down," she says, and resumes her seat.

The chair's a little too close to her. He kicks it back, pointedly, and sits. She's considering him, blue eyes steady and grave, and he gets the feeling of familiarity again—and a sudden rush of emotion so pure he's not even sure what it is. He censors it automatically.

He meets her gaze—I'll see your blue eyes and raise you a smile. He knows he's gaunt, face hollowed, eyes blank as an animal's after four months and all those needle tracks. He's caught flashes of himself in the two-way glass. He sees her note the smile, but she doesn't return it. She doesn't seem worried.

"We were wondering," she says, "whether you might talk to Jack Bristow."

Oh, Christ, he thinks in disgust, each new tactic more threadbare than the last. He tilts back his head, giving her the very picture of fatigue.

"Certainly," he says to the ceiling, eyes closed. "Although as I've probably fucked his wife more than he has, I doubt he'll be very keen."

Silence.

He opens his eyes, looks back at her, finally, wanting to get on with it.

"Agent Bristow's been—out of touch recently," she says quietly. She lets that drift for a moment.

"We think they might have met up—he and Derevko."

She's looking at him with something like compassion—ah. There's the angle, the new thing. And she is not, he understands, anything resembling a good cop. In fact, the drugs are likely hers. She's probably advised on the pacing and intensity of his interrogation, if not the actual lines of questioning. He's sure she's a very good liar.

His heart rate is picking up. He forces himself to breathe slowly. Careful, now. He looks back up at the ceiling, says wearily:

"Then I suggest—doctor—that you leave the man in peace. He'll have a lot of catching up to do."

He can't process what she's told him. Its destructive potential is too great and it's probably a lie in any case; it'll have to wait for when he can evaluate it more carefully. But there's more, apparently.

"We believe—if we put the word out where he'll hear it—that he'll want to see you," she says. He doesn't move, except to close his eyes again. "He'll think you might be able to help find his daughter, whom we suspect has been taken by Arvin Sloane."

She delivers each statement with the abstracted air of a card player selecting the next discard. She surely knows that he waits for her next words with something that he recognizes, from some arctic mental distance, as terror.

It's probably not true, or not entirely. She'll have put it together, made the right psychological inferences, constructed a scenario likely to force his remaining defenses. Carefully engineered the lies. _Don't anticipate._

But the doubt is incidental. His real problem, suddenly, is this: he needs to walk out of the room with one more piece of information. She'll try to make him ask; lies or not, that's part of the game.

Because if it's true—and it could be true—he really doubts that Sloane is involved. _How long, doctor?_ How long since they've been gone? When it's clear he isn't going to say anything more, she tells him what he knows she knows he's waiting for, her blue eyes watchful.

"Sydney Bristow disappeared the week she brought you in from Stockholm," she says in that conversational voice, and a wave of nausea hits him. He forces himself to relax. Irina taught him this, to achieve passivity and just take it—pleasure or pain, let it wash through you and leave you behind when it goes. He knows there's more. She gives it to him.

"Her father's been gone for more than three months," she finishes, and just that simply, he learns what it feels like to break.

He fades out, dizzy with vertigo and the sudden cold sweat it brings. It's too visible a reaction; he knows she's reading every ragged breath. He has to look down or he'll be sick.

Three months, and the conclusion stares him in the face. No, he thinks, Sloane isn't in the picture, or only peripherally. The woman understands, or she wouldn't be here, watching him so clinically. He's helpless, he finds, to imagine any other contingency. The picture is all too vivid, too much what Irina has worked for, in her way, all along.

The picture is this: Jack Bristow—Sydney Bristow. And Irina. The family circle closed at last, and if she ever had any intention of pulling him out, it's expired three months since, at a minimum.

He can't close his eyes; he'll be overcome by nausea. He's completely still, limbs useless, because any move will make obvious the shuddering sickness that cripples even his breathing.

—Deal with it, you fool, he thinks. You've got the resources. But his body's not listening and if he unclenches his teeth the sound clawing its way out of his throat is going to escape. He takes one jagged, desperate breath and forces down the urge to howl like a beaten dog.

They sit there together, he and the woman, for another few minutes, not speaking. He's still looking at the floor, slightly steadier now, breathing more evenly. He wonders whether he'll be able to walk back to the cell. She gets to her feet, finally, stands looking down at him for a moment.

Well done, doctor. Brilliantly intuited, perfectly played.

She heads for the door. He hears her tap on the glass. Without turning in his chair, he says, "Doctor."

No sound of the door opening. His back is still turned to her but he's smiling for the cameras and the observers behind the glass.

"My compliments." No reply. "You're the best so far."

She waits, giving him the chance to go on, but he's finished. She taps on the glass again and the door opens this time. But doesn't close. He turns, finally, not liking the feeling of her at his back. There's a species of professional regret on her face.

"My name is Barnett," she tells him. "Ask for me if you want to—talk." His crack of laughter echoes in the empty cube of a room. And here comes Sheena, followed by Sikes. He makes them pull him out of the chair, which they do, with displeasure. Back to the cell.

Hope's a useful thing at times, but on the whole, it's a relief when it's gone.

The following day he interrupts the interrogation. He wants a drink of water: the only thing, in more than four months, that he's asked for. He knows his captors will make the desired assumptions.

They bring him cold water in a paper cup. They watch while he drinks, holding the cup lightly with both hands, like a child, because his wrists are bound. He lets them see the slight tremor, otherwise tightly controlled.

He thanks them. Sets the cup clumsily on the concrete floor, next to his chair, claiming it as his. They allow him to keep it.

It's still there, half full, when they move him back to the cell.

_**Three**_

They leave him alone for several days between the next few sessions. He knows the rhythm. By the time they come for him again, he'll almost be glad. That's how it's supposed to work; he would come to love even the pain, eventually, if he were stupid enough let it happen.

His plans are as definite as he can make them. He lets himself drift, in the long idle time when there's no way to advance things. Not repining, really. Remembering.

Irina, years ago, showing him a photograph of Agent Sydney Bristow; and his first thought, looking at the image. Christ, he'd said to himself, not two of them. Amused, the fear camouflaged, because the picture made her uncannily like her mother.

His first sight of Sydney, in the flesh, and the trickle of icy pleasure down his spine. And then, for some reason, that first day he'd faced her across the conference table at SD-6. He'd been transfixed, had to force himself to look away from Irina's child. With Irina's husband sitting just to his left.

—Jack Bristow. Never a doubt in his mind who'd claimed Irina first. But never a belief, either, in his most conservative assessment of risk, that there would ever be a time when what she'd broken would be made whole.

And that brings him back to the cold cell and the constant pain, but he's tolerant of both, having so much more to occupy him now. They won't want to wait too long. He's weaker by the day, and they want what he can still give them without the trouble of rehabilitating him. He hasn't tried to bargain, yet.

And here they are, but he's shed the physical reaction by this time. There's a lot at stake now; today's the day, if he's calculated accurately. They're walking a different route to a different door. Another cube of a room, but this one's carpeted. A table, with a chair on either side of it. A man, facing him.

Untidy hair, tired face with deep lines around the mouth. Long hands clasped lightly on the table; dead green eyes. The Boy Scout, no longer so pretty. His heart clenches fiercely for an instant because this is what he'd planned; this is the beginning of the end. He calms his breathing and waits.

"Sark." The voice is quiet, flat. "Sit down."

He does, awkwardly. They've bound his hands behind him this time. Michael Vaughn looks at him wearily.

"You've played this just right and here's the reward. You say you don't know where Sloane would go, where he would take Sydney. But you know where the trail might start." Green eyes looking into his, cold and indifferent.

"So you get one chance, Sark. We'll take you to Mexico City. You come out with solid evidence of his whereabouts—hers—and we'll think about letting you take us another step. You come out with nothing, we're done. And you can spin this out—yeah, we understand that. But only so long. Because here's the deal, Sark. It's three moves to Sloane. Or Sydney. Or we're really done."

But it'll only take one to get himself loose. It's going to be this one. He stares at the other man for a moment before nodding his head. And because there's now something to gain by testing him, he says softly:

"Sloane, I take it, is the priority, Agent Vaughn?"

The man's face is blank but the eyes holding his have come to life. Cold fury, but the voice is still flat.

"You'll be carrying an implant next to your spinal cord; we're trying out a new paralytic neurotoxin, soluble capsule. There's a 36-hour time limit and the effects, if you happen to miss your deadline, are slow but not reversible."

So, well. The Bel Air clinic will have a little more to deal with than he'd thought. But that was his first stop in any case—a private organization staffed by specialists in anonymity and forgetfulness. He experiences a wave of longing for the simple fact of health, movement, freedom from pain, and nearly gasps with the intensity of it. He lets it go.

Almost there. He'll be there tomorrow.

Michael Vaughn adds casually, "And I'll shoot you if you so much as twitch out of turn at any point in the next 36 hours."

He withholds his smile. The delivery's impressive but Vaughn's missed him before. He's probably adequate with a paper target.

Vaughn nods at someone standing at the door behind him, and here they come to take him away. He holds the agent's gaze until they force him around, wondering whether Sydney's choice will make or break the man—or perhaps neither. He feels a distant amusement at his own recognition that their situations share certain ironies.

Like mother, like daughter, though Irina's body count is undoubtedly higher. He wonders whether she'd planned to abandon him from the beginning. It might simply be a case of new priorities. In the cold equations that express her reasoning, he's only one variable.

They implant the capsule later that day, none too careful about the anesthesia. He can neither sit nor lie down comfortably, but that's been true for weeks.

There's a certain comedy to the whole thing that threatens to undo him, at times. What a nuisance she must occasionally have found his devotion, and how forbearing she was. He plays with the notion that gratitude might be his best response, in the end. There was Khasinau, after all—and others. Her indifference is a gift to him, perhaps.

In lieu of sleep, he evaluates his role as a placeholder in her life: neither child nor consort, neither son nor mate. He reminds himself that he's always known what she really wants. The solution to Rambaldi's puzzle. Sydney, her image, creation, and heir. And Jack Bristow, the only man alive who burns but is not consumed in Irina Derevko's fire.

Fair enough. Irina's protégé has no grounds for complaint. Irina's lover was never faithful, never expected faith in return. And Irina's employee has been made redundant twice over, sacked without notice, and owes no further allegiance on any score.

There's an ember of something, though, that flares now and again behind his eyes as he tries to rest in the perpetual glare of the cell. He experiences it as a kind of pain, since pain is now the defining fact of his existence. He moves restlessly on the unpadded steel shelf, still sick from the last session, his bones now too prominent for any position to be comfortable for long.

Tomorrow, one way or another—poison or not, bullet or not; his appetite for risk is now huge. It's beyond time. He wonders, now, why he held out so long.

One month, she'd said. As much mercy as she's ever shown anyone.

_**Four**_

As always, it's luck as much as anything. There's certainly no need to feign weakness. They come for him early and the dry retching when he swings his feet to the ground is real. They back away till he stops, then stand him up and bind his hands in front of him. He looks at Michael Vaughn, outside the glass door.

"Is it really necessary, Agent Vaughn?" Tiredly, holding up his hands, the wrists already swollen and scabbing from previous restraints. The guards always tighten them too much, glad to contribute their mite to the general regime, and plastic is worse than metal, in the long run.

"Shut up," Vaughn says. But then, to Sheena, "Loosen them. Not too much." The guard allows the cutters to tighten the plastic further as he positions them to break the disposable cuffs. He takes a new pair from the holder on his belt.

"Motherfucker," he says under his breath, jerking the loops over Sark's hands and pulling them closed. Sark smiles lovingly at him.

"You're lucky I haven't eaten breakfast," he murmurs, swaying slightly. "But I'll try to avoid your shoes next time." The big man moves back abruptly.

Three checkpoints before they even get to the Ops Center staging area, three more once they're in the van. Vaughn and two guards with Sark in the back, the driver and his backup in the front. The rear doors and the slider lock from the driver's console. No windows and no weapons in the back.

The van's a relief. He's guessed that they're flying out of Van Nuys. A helicopter would have made things much more difficult, the distance between the helipad and the jetway shorter, more open. As it is, they'll have to cross a perimeter, he knows, go through at least one building to get to the aircraft. Something will offer itself, some chance; all he needs.

It's not even light yet but the traffic's heavy through the Sepulveda Pass; the driver brakes and accelerates with sickening frequency around the curves. Sark retches again, his body protesting the too-sudden changes of attitude in the horizonless space. Flanking him, Sheena and the other guard edge away.

Vaughn, from a safer distance, says, "I'll kill you." Sark laughs.

They let him step out unaided when the van finally pulls up and stops. He's shaky but knows, after a half-second look, exactly where he is. Most of the fixed-base operators at Van Nuys are on the far side of the field. Raytheon's aircraft services facility is one of the few on the tower side, fronting the longer of the airport's two runways.

From a gap between buildings he has a view across the field, with single and twin-engine craft queuing for tower clearance the minute the noise ordinances will allow them to fly. They'll be doing touch-and-goes on the shorter runway all day long.

He's lucky again. The terminal parking lot is large and almost full; the passenger terminal will be busy—or as busy as it ever gets. Even if his handlers have special clearance, they'll have to take him through the building. Security, he knows, is good on the field and around the hangars and ramps, but very light in the few passenger areas.

He's even been inside the Raytheon terminal before. He knows exactly which door he needs to get through.

The air is laced with hydrocarbons and already warming at this early hour. He fills his lungs. Almost time now.

He's not fast enough to suit Sheena. Before they reach the terminal he gets a shove.

"Move it, asshole," is the other guard's contribution. It takes almost nothing to turn the honest stumble into a fall. He goes down shoulder first, rests with his cheek against the asphalt. Sheena's inventive profanity is bitten off. A pair of polished Rockports approaches and stops.

Vaughn's voice, quietly furious: "He's got 26 hours left, Larson. Am I going to be reporting a delay to AD Kendall?"

"Sorry." Sark can almost feel Vaughn's lust to strike the man.

He's got 26 hours. He can work with that. The guards get him to his feet while Vaughn watches.

_Larson_. How dull.

_**Five**_

Inside now. He misses a step, halts for a moment, unsteady again. No need for extra verisimilitude; he knows he's pale as a corpse. He takes a shaky breath, moves forward before the trio can make an issue of it. He's at the center of a loose group, Michael Vaughn in the lead, the other two flanking him, denying other passengers the sight of a man in restraints.

And there it is, _Employees Only_, with a men's room just beyond. Another three steps. Sark stops again.

The terminal smells of fresh coffee; the guards are inattentive. They continue a few strides without him.

"Agent Vaughn." A furious backward glare. They all come to a halt, turn back toward him. People move past them in clots, walking briskly. Nobody's paying particular attention and the soothing clatter of footsteps on the old industrial linoleum swallows the conversation.

"It might be wise," he says, and stops, swallowing hard. Still almost no need for playacting; he could easily hit the ground again. "Perhaps these gentlemen would accompany me—" pointing with his chin. Lucky a third time: if Vaughn spent more time in the field he'd see the setup in a heartbeat.

Sydney would have him trussed and spitted for roasting by now, Sark thinks. His mouth twitches.

Vaughn exhales sharply, staring at him with loathing. He flicks open his mobile phone, speed-dials a number. "Prager," he says to the second guard, "check in with the pilot. Larson, take him in and for godssake stay out of his way. This is Vaughn," he adds into the phone, goading the reluctant Larson with an impatient jerk of his head. Prager is now headed up the concourse toward the gate.

Sark sways again, looking at Larson. _After you, my dear Alphonse_. And the big man turns in disgust and leads the way to the restroom. _Ten seconds._

He follows just quickly enough that the guard's over-the-shoulder check shows him nothing alarming. He's almost level with the door he needs; there's a chest-high steel barrier that ends two feet from the floor, shielding the entrance from the public. No auto-lock, no card-reader; old facility. _Eight seconds_.

Without acceleration or superfluous motion he ducks smoothly and rolls under the barrier, reaches the handle and shoves the door open just enough to slip inside, rolls to his feet out of view of the concourse. More luck than he deserves: the room's empty. A shout is cut off by the closing door. He throws the lock. _Six._

Move, move, move. The bank of shelves for employees' possessions. A cap to cover the telltale blond hair: _IAMAW_. A windcheater, flung awkwardly over his shoulders: _Los Angeles Lakers_.

He needs keys, car keys, car keys with an electronic lock. He scrabbles clumsily through a backpack, a gym bag—there.

Larson's slow but close. Vaughn's inexperienced but smart. Between the two of them they'll have the building covered in short order and time's up, time's up: _move_.

Out the door to the employee lot, passing a few stragglers coming in after the shift change. A hell of a lot of cars. He presses the lock, listens for a chirp. Nothing. Still nobody coming out the door.

Again, moving through the rows of cars, trying to look like he knows where he's headed. Again. Nothing.

Get to it, man, he thinks to himself. Again—and the answering peep from the automobile. He pings it once more, finds a nondescript Honda, several years old. He's in, starts the car, gives himself no time to think; puts his right knee on the passenger seat, braces his cuffed hands underneath it, and wrenches the left hand with all the strength he's got against its plastic bond.

Halfway. He shuts his eyes, forcing out the tears that have risen involuntarily. Another brutal wrench. The plastic loop comes over, dislocating his thumb, and he grays out against the seatback. But his right hand is only bruised, and the car, mercifully, has an automatic transmission. He shrugs into the windcheater and nearly faints getting the left arm into the sleeve. Focus, damn you.

He joins the short queue at the exit. The key card's in the visor but he has to lean out and feed it right-handed to the reader. He's out on the street when he sees the ramp guards coming at a dead run from their normal posts out to the parking area. They're armed. He's in traffic and moving.

The freeway on-ramp is three blocks. He's got to get on and get over the pass to the Sunset exit, then negotiate the Bel Air meander, where the clinic's compound sits on prime lakefront acreage. It's ten miles, fifteen maximum.

He forces down a surge of bile at the back of his throat. Don't jar the left hand, idiot. He props the elbow on the armrest and joins the morning rush hour on the 405.

_**Six**_

The remote end of Stone Canyon Road is overhung with eucalyptus, excellent cover against aerial search and pursuit, though it's probably still too soon for that, he thinks. He's negotiating the narrow road but only just: Eyes on the white line, keep tracking. Five more minutes to go.

The clinic fronts a small lake at the very end of the road: twelve hectares comprising structures, grounds, and three successively tight security perimeters. The facility protects its clients with inaccessibility, space, and, discreetly, a hell of a lot of firepower. The security staff is large, seasoned, and very well compensated.

He passes the guardhouse, pulls around the carriage sweep, enters the building. If you know the way, you can get this far with no trouble whatever.

The woman behind the glass is dazzling, as beautiful as anyone he's ever seen, and deliciously cool. She assesses him head to foot with her dark, dark eyes. He's holding on by a thread but he manages a smile.

He tells her: "I'd like to check in. There's a car outside. You'll need to have someone drive it back to the Raytheon employees' lot at Van Nuys airport, quickly." She smiles back, unruffled.

"Inform the medical staff that the capsule I'm carrying under the incision in my back holds a timed-release poison. I'm—" he looks hazily at the clock over the angel's shoulder— "twenty-five hours from zero—so I'm told." She raises an eyebrow.

"And I've dislocated my left thumb, which is uncomfortable. I'd like to have that seen to immediately, please."

She looks him over for another few seconds.

"Carlos," she says. One of the four armed guards behind him approaches with a pair of cutters. His right wrist is divested of its plastic cuff.

"If you would step into the booth, please," the woman tells him coolly, nodding at a spot over his shoulder. "You'll be scanned for biometric identification. You'll find a point-of-sale terminal to your right. Please authorize access to the institution and the account of your choice."

He does admire the dispatch of it all. And her voice: beautiful, with an understated lilt that's surely a memory of her native country, wherever they breed women this lovely.

He submits, patiently, to the scan: facial geometry, retina, thumbprint—right hand only. Sways, increasingly distant, while the hard-encrypted files are sent out to one of the private banks where his personal accounts are of sufficient magnitude for the clinic to admit him with confidence. While the decrypts are submitted to several discrete databases at several sites, and the search for a match is run, and the re-encrypted response tunnels its secret way from backbone to backbone, node to node, and hits the clinic's firewall in turn. Is gathered in, thoroughly scrubbed, and decrypted once more.

No sound heralds the arrival of succor and aid, merely the inner door opening silently onto white-coated figures, a stretcher with IV threaded and waiting. He lingers a moment more to see the smile on the face of the angel at the desk, and is rewarded.

"Mr. Sark," the woman says. "Welcome." He stumbles on his way to the door, but they catch him before he can fall.

One of his private bolt-holes, held in reserve, never used until now. He thinks Irina probably won't bother looking, in any case. He imagines her amusement, her shrug of disappointment that he's wasted himself, denying the obvious.

She had all of him there was for anyone to have. He thinks of Khasinau, of Jack Bristow, and smiles again, lips skinning back over his teeth as they help him onto the soft, cool stretcher.

If she's lucky, she'll never see him again.

_**End**_

July 14, 2003

30527 Rez In Tenebris16 of 16


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